Two home-grown musical groups with distinctly different styles will be featured at the December and January “Third Friday” Andover Community Coffeehouse concerts. The concerts in the Highland Lake Grange Hall are open to the public at no charge; donations are accepted.
The December 18 “Third Friday” Coffeehouse will feature the Lowe Profiles, a trio of three local sisters: New London’s Kathy Lowe-Bloch, Susie Lowe-Stockwell of South Sutton, and Kim Lowe-Beaton of Bradford. They’ll be singing original and traditional songs of winter celebration, but with a vaudeville twist.
To celebrate the spirit of the season, attendees are invited to bring along their best singing voices for raising the cheer. Songbooks will be available to help the audience join in on Kathy Lowe’s own festive compositions, which will also be available for purchase on her Wishing You Peace CD.
As the Coffeehouse nears its first anniversary, an organizer looks back on a year of surprises
After one early monthly performance, Paul Currier, chair of the Coffeehouse working group, described the community’s response as “beyond all expectations.” The characterization continues to apply, according to working-group member Cindy Benson, as the Coffeehouse is about to enter its second year of operation in January.
After 11 months of concerts, Benson expands: “From the willingness — and eagerness — of well-known performers to lend their professional support, to the variety of talents displayed by open-mic participants, to the enthusiasm of the audiences, to the support of the Andover Congregational Church through its food sales, to the cadre of local volunteers who assure that everything runs smoothly — all these elements come together, month after month, in a way that is truly impressive. We are thankful to everyone who has supported this community activity.”
Featured performers to date include: January: Richard King, Sferes and White; February: Cathy Lowe; March: Click Horning; April: Tom Pirozzoli; May: Sferes and White; June: Decatur Creek; July: Kenny Weiland; Special July outdoor concert: Lindsey Schust and the Ragged Mountain Band; August: Scott King; September: Neptune’s Car; October: NewFound Grass; November: Julie Snow; December: the Lowe Profiles.
Andover open-mic performers to date include: Carl Ahern, Cindy Benson, Brooks Bicknell, Margo Coolidge, Joe Dupuis, Percy Hill, The Living Stones, Robyn Macy, Vicky Mishcon, Janet Moore, Doug Phelps, Sferes and White, Nancy Tripp, and Josh Wagner.
Event sponsors to date: March: Jimmy Sferes Professional Guitar Instruction; April: Horizons Engineering; May: Belletetes Building Products Specialists; June: Highland Lake Inn; July: Dr. Jonathan Mishcon, Tilton Medical Associates; July Special: Andover Pizza Chef; August: Ragged Mountain Physical Therapy; September: Proctor Academy; October: Longtail Publishing; November: Anonymous, in honor of the Northern Rail Trail; December: Highland Lake Apple Farm.
The Andover Community Coffeehouse operates under the umbrella of the Andover Community Association (ACA).
On Friday, January 15, the Warner-based quartet known as the DoBros will offer what they brand as “music for the common-folk,” which blends a mix of “blues, folk, bluegrass, rhythm, funk, roots, rock, reggae, Americana, fusion, disco, Motown, jazz, calypso and psychedelia into a style all its own: farm funk.” Group members are Ben Dobrowski (guitar, vocals); Luke Dobrowski (drums, vocals, banjo, mandolin); Colin Nevins (guitar, vocals); and Chris Spann-Weitz (bass).
Also appearing onstage both evenings will be up to a dozen open-microphone performers, whose contributions in previous months have ranged from the spoken word to show-business, jazz, folk, bluegrass, and country-and-western tunes. Open-mic participants in the December 15 show are invited to prepare winter-related or holiday-themed songs in the spirit of the season.
For Lowe Profiles lead singer Kathy Lowe-Bloch, the December appearance will mark her second as a featured act at the Andover Community Coffeehouse, having performed before a standing-room-only audience there in February. Since writing her first song at age 11, she’s performed literally around the world and now focuses on audience participation, sound healing, and therapeutic music for audiences in schools, nursing homes, hospitals, and veterans’ centers. Learn more about her work at KathyLoweMusic.com.
The DoBros made their major debut more recently, at the Warner Fall Foliage Festival in 2013, on that town’s newly constructed post-and-beam stage. Since then they have performed throughout northern New England at venues in Concord, Littleton, and Hanover, New Hampshire; Winooski, Vermont; Cambridge, Massachusetts; and elsewhere. The band has yet to record a studio album, but it has a solid base of original material which it performs at every show. for more information, visit Facebook.com/TheDoBrosNH.
Doors to the Grange Hall will open at 6 PM for food purchases offered by the Andover Congregational Church and for open-mic sign-ins on a first-come, first-serve basis. The sponsor for the evening is the Highland Lake Apple Farm in East Andover, located on Maple Street just across Route 11 from the Coffeehouse. The January sponsor is an anonymous supporter of the Andover Community Association.
Information about future dates and scheduled performers, and a photographic record of the performers, both headliners and open-mic participants, are shown at AndoverCoffeehouse.org or on the Facebook page “Andover Community Coffeehouse.”
Video recordings of past programs are shown on a number of community-access channels across the state and are available at Andover.NH.us by clicking on “Town Information” and then “Video Archive.”